War of Wolves (Book 1)

Shattered Scales

    I sniffed the air, the hairs on the back of my neck rising. I had been on edge since we left the relative safety of the castle. Despite Alex's constant pestering, it was dusk by the time we had actually left.
    We crept around in the darkness, not wanting to light any torches or lanterns in fear of being mistaken as enemies. Alicia shivered in the frigid night air. Seeing the girl's steamy breath, Grace wrapped her brown cloak around the girl, pulling her in close.
    "Stay with me for a little," the older girl ordered. "I'll keep you warm."
    I smiled at the two, taking three large strides to catch up with them. I made to open my mouth to start a conversation, though I was cut off by a loud thump, followed by a woman moaning in pain. I turned on my heels, my eyes landing on Alex.
    "My foot!" She growled, shifting around on the ground so that she was in a sitting position. "Whatever it was cut clean through my boot!"
    "Are you alright?" Atreus asked, kneeling down next to the fallen girl. "Alright, I think we're far enough. Light a lantern, Chris."
    Chris knelt on the ground, setting down the primitive metal object. After a few moments, and, with a bit of mild cursing, a small flame was going. He lit the lantern, then quickly blew out the other flame he had created.
    Chris held the lantern over Alex, illuminating a slick patch of blood coating the grass. He placed a hand over his mouth as he lowered the lantern to her foot.
     I looked away, trying to ignore the horrible smell of blood. Calli walked over to me, a concerned expression on her face. I offered her a worried smile.
    "This is gonna hurt," Atreus warned Alex. Not giving her time to prepare, he placed his hand by her foot, waited half a moment, and tore something out of the bleeding gash.
     Alex cried out in pain, instinctively thrashing out at Atreus. The boy, getting out of kicking distance, held up a blood coated object. Gracia, abandoning Alicia, rushed forward and snatched it out of his hand.
     "Enn!" Gracia gasped. "She was here! S-She must be injured! She hasn't lost a scale in eight years!"
     Alia took the supposed scale from the brunette, carefully examining it in her hands. "She's not wrong. This is her scale. It doesn't do much for us though. Finding this one was like finding a bird in a hurricane."
      "We should keep going," Atreus ordered. "Will you be okay to walk on that foot?"
     The girl shook her head. "I don't think I can even put weight on it. And it should probably be bandaged before I lose too much blood."
     Gracia walked over to Alex, passing Alicia off to me. She tore a strip of her dress, biting it off with her teeth. She wrapped it around Alex's foot as many times as she could before tightening it hard enough that Alex had to stifle a scream. WIth surprisingly little effort, Gracia picked Alex off the ground and placed her on her back, like she were giving Alex a piggyback ride. Alex yelped in surprise, clinging so tightly to Gracia I was surprised the brunette's face didn't turn blue.
    "Let's go a little further before we settle down for the night. It's too open out here. It makes me feel uneasy." Gracia, not looking or acting quite herself, led the way into the trees, Alex still clinging to her neck. "Something seems off about tonight."
    Our group stared at each other for a long moment before rushing to catch up with the brunette. As we walked, I kept looking at my surroundings. Now that she mentioned it, something did seem off about the night.
    The sky was cloudless, a full moon shining larger than I had ever seen. Every star in the still sky seemed to be shining on triple power. I could hear crickets chirping loudly in the late summer weather. The trees gently rustled, despite there being no wind. The night was too perfect.
    We only walked for a few minutes into the woods, at which point direction was impossible to tell north from south. Calli and Lycasia quickly set out to find firewood, taking Alicia with them. Gracia set down Alex and left with Atreus to go hunt, leaving me alone with Alex and Chris.
    "You alright?" Chris asked, squatting next to Alex. In the darkness, his face appeared unusually pale. "Think you'll get Dragon's Sickness? I'll ask Gracia to clean it up for you when she gets back."
    "It's kinda funny," Alex commented. "Mortals don't know what Dragon's Sickness is, and yet they're the ones who have a cure for it."
    "Not fair," Chris shook his head, placing a hand on the ground to keep himself balanced. "They don't know what it's like living here. We can live so long and yet we're in the dark ages compared to them. No running water, no electricity, no air conditioning."
    "What I wouldn't give for a nice warm bath right now," Alex gave a sigh of contempt. "I'd love to be curled up in a nice heated blanket, watching a movie with..." She faltered, her face turning red enough to see in the dark.
    "With who?" Chris asked, clearly not understanding boundaries. He inched closer so that his face was almost touching her's. "Andrew?"
    'Gods, how dense are you?" The girl stared at the ground. "If it were Andrew, I wouldn't be so embarrassed to say!"
    "Who is it your in love with?" Chris supported himself on her shoulders, causing Alex's face to remind me of Rudolph's nose.
    "You divine idiot! It's you! I'm in love with you, for the sake of every god that has ever existed." She placed her hands around his waist and pulled him in closer. "Why won't you just admit you've known? I've loved you for so long!"
    I felt compelled to avert my eyes. This wasn't any of my business, even if I may have had the smallest of crushes on Alex growing up. Besides, it appeared that I would be stuck with Calli for a while. And who knew what was going on in Gracia's head.
    "I'm gonna go find Gracia," I looked back when the voices resumed. Chris had taken a few steps away from Alex. "Her and Atreus have been gone for a while."
    "Sorry, Andrew," Alex refused to raise her eyes from the ground. "I just needed to say that or else I fear I never would have. I don't quite know if it is truly love, but I can't change the way I feel about him."